[Boatanchors] Patron Saint of Amateur Radio

[Joe Connor]

Today is the feast day of Father Maximilian Kolbe, the Catholic Church's patron saint of amateur radio and a remarkable man.
Kolbe was a priest in Poland. He became interested in radio as a tool for evangelization. In 1938, he obtained an amateur license (callsign SP3RN), built his own station and began making test broadcasts. 
Kolbe opposed the Nazis and was imprisoned in the Auschwitz concentration camp in early 1941.
On July 31, 1941, a prisoner escaped from the camp, and the Nazis randomly chose 10 other prisoners to be executed in retaliation for the escape. One of them was a young father, who cried out that he'd never see his wife and children again. 
The young father was a stranger to Kolbe, but Kolbe stepped forward and took the young father's place among the condemned. Kolbe and the other condemned men were locked in an underground bunker to die a slow and painful death from starvation. 
Kolbe succumbed on August 14, 1941. The young father whom Kolbe saved survived the war. 

                         Joe Connor